Spontaneous echo contrast in the left atrial appendage is linked to a higher risk of thromboembolic events and mortality in patients with atrial fibrillation.

Background: Cardioversion, a rhythm control treatment for atrial fibrillation (AF), requires ruling out cardiac embolic sources, often originating from the left atrial appendage (LAA). Transesophageal echocardiography (TEE) is used for LAA evaluation, but it is invasive and not widely available. This study aimed to identify cardiovascular risk factors linked to LAA abnormalities and predictors of thromboembolic events and all-cause mortality.

Comparative benchmarking of failure detection methods in medical image segmentation: Unveiling the role of confidence aggregation.

Semantic segmentation is an essential component of medical image analysis research, with recent deep learning algorithms offering out-of-the-box applicability across diverse datasets. Despite these advancements, segmentation failures remain a significant concern for real-world clinical applications, necessitating reliable detection mechanisms. This paper introduces a comprehensive benchmarking framework aimed at evaluating failure detection methodologies within medical image segmentation.

S100B Serum Levels in Chronic Heart Failure Patients: A Multifaceted Biomarker Linking Cardiac and Cognitive Dysfunction.

S100 calcium-binding protein B (S100B) is a protein primarily known as a biomarker for central nervous system (CNS) injuries, reflecting blood-brain barrier (BBB) permeability and dysfunction. Recently, S100B has also been implicated in cardiovascular diseases, including heart failure (HF). Thus, we investigated serum levels of S100B in 146 chronic HF patients from the Cognition.

Long-term cognitive and brain morphologic changes in chronic heart failure: Results of the Cognition.Matters-HF study.

Aims: Cognitive impairment (CI) is a common, yet frequently unrecognized co-morbidity in chronic heart failure (HF). We quantified trajectories of cognitive performance, brain volume, and related clinical outcome over a time course of 6 years.

Methods And Results: The Cognition.